From Proof to Perfection; The Genesis of the Vollard Suites by Bonnard, Denis, Vuillard, Roussel, and Clot

At the turn of the 20th century, the celebrated art dealer and publisher Ambroise Vollard commissioned four extraordinary suites of colour lithographs from the Nabi artists Pierre Bonnard, Maurice Denis, Edouard Vuillard, and Ker-Xavier Roussel. Published around 1899 and printed by the master lithographer Auguste Clot, these series, each comprising twelve prints and a cover, are among the finest accomplishments in the field of artistic color lithography.

Author and curator, Fleur Roos Rosa de Carvalho unpacks the recently released catalogue From Proof to Perfection, which reunites a remarkable body of preparatory drawings, trial proofs, and related works in other media, revealing the full scope of artistic decision-making behind these celebrated suites, sketching the broader landscape of late 19th-century lithography, and introducing the artists Bonnard, Denis, Vuillard, and Roussel; Clot as printer; and Vollard as the visionary orchestrator of the project.

Fleur Roos Rosa de Carvalho is Senior Curator of Prints and Drawings at the Van Gogh Museum, Amsterdam. She was responsible for the exhibition and catalogue Prints in Paris 1900: From Elite to the Street (2017) and is the author of several other publications on late 19th-century French art, focusing on printmaking, Impressionism, Post-Impressionism, and Symbolism. She has curated many exhibitions at the Van Gogh Museum and is currently working on an exhibition and catalogue on Eva Gonzalès in collaboration with the Petit Palais, Paris (2026).